The mecca of American racing

By Richard Petty, Special to Turner Sports Interactive
July 31, 2001
5:07 PM EDT (2107 GMT)

You hear a lot about some of the drivers today, and how they grew up hoping to run one day at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Years ago, we figured we could run at Indianapolis too -- only if we were going to do it, it was going to have to be in an Indy-car.

Indianapolis is a big race for us, just like it is to the Indy-car guys. I don’t know that it is as big a race as it is to the Indy-car guys, but it’s still pretty big. We always kind of looked at the Indianapolis 500 as the Daytona 500 of Indy-car racing. I don’t think any of us ever thought we would be racing there -- not with stock cars, anyway.

We race at Indianapolis for a lot of reasons. First of all, it’s a pretty nice race track. Tony George and the folks up there have done an incredible job with that facility. It’s really nice. The track itself is as smooth as anything we run on. The garages are nice and usually pretty roomy. And they go out of their way to make sure you have everything you need.

Indy was one of the tracks NASCAR started taking a look at when we were looking at expanding our markets. There is a reason the NBA and the NFL is in Indianapolis -- it’s an important market to them. Indianapolis is a pretty important market to us. You have to remember, when we started running there, Indianapolis was the closest thing we had to Chicago, St. Louis and a lot of the Midwest. And it is still a pretty important link for our sponsors.

Plus, one of the ways I look at it is we owed something to our fans in the Midwest. If you lived in, say, Chicago or wherever in the Midwest, you had a hard time getting to a Winston Cup track. You could go to Talladega or to Michigan, but that was pretty much it. Adding tracks like Indianapolis and, later on, Chicago, helped bring our sport to a lot more fans.

Television is a good thing because it gives folks a chance to see what we have to offer. But it doesn’t compare to actually being there. The FOX and NBC folks do a great job but there is no way to show what it’s like to actually be sitting in the stands or standing on pit road when 43 cars crank those engines and take off.

Our deal all along has been getting somebody to their first race. If you look back at how NASCAR marketed itself -- and, basically, how it still markets itself -- it’s getting somebody to go to their very first race. You do that, and they are hooked. It’s hard getting somebody to one, but getting somebody to two is a whole lot easier.

Once you bring a race into somebody’s hometown -- or in the case of a Chicago or whatever, a lot of somebodies hometown -- they come see it. Whether they are curious or hear about it from a friend or just are looking for something to do, it’s a lot easier to get them in those grandstands if the race is nearby.

And they will be back once they’ve seen one.

The thing is, the interest doesn’t leave town with the transporters. People keep paying attention to the series, who is doing what and who is racing where and who is winning, who is losing. They keep up with the points and they watch it on television.

New markets help with everything. It gives our sponsors new places to do things. It helps the television ratings. It generates interest among the media in that particular market, and they probably start covering it more and more, and that leads to more interest. It’s one of those good snowballs rolling down hill, getting bigger and better.

Yeah, the race at Indianapolis is a good one. There is a lot of tradition and heritage there. We’re starting our own tradition and heritage.

But the biggest thing is we’re building new fans every time we go up there. And you can never have enough fans.